


My Love from Long Ago

by FunnyFootsteps



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, First Crush, M/M, Sibling Bonding, they actually meet in the second chapter, well mostly his sisters laugh at his silly crush but
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2021-02-25
Packaged: 2021-03-11 03:09:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,390
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28328043
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FunnyFootsteps/pseuds/FunnyFootsteps
Summary: No piece of art had ever captured his heart like this. The room around him seemed suddenly very quiet as if he was alone there. The king had a serious expression on the painting, but Dedue could easily imagine him smiling. He should smile.Dedue, age twelve, gets an unusual crush
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/Dedue Molinaro
Comments: 20
Kudos: 35





	1. Past

Fhridiad Museum didn't interest Dedue much, and the weapon exhibit appealed to him even less. They had so many weapons. Just halls and halls filled with axes, lances, and swords with occasional armor pieces stuffed between them. 

A museum guide with narrow ideas of what twelve-year-old boys liked, had tried to show him a silver battleaxe. He could barely look at the display, yet he also wanted to hold the weapon for some reason. It made him so nervous that he fled the scene, leaving his elder sister to apologize to the confused guide. 

Dedue wasn't sure if he liked Fhridiad at all. The whole city felt strangely familiar but in a somewhat uncomfortable way, and leaving hometown always filled him with unfounded dread that he could never return. He wished he could have stayed home with grandma instead. 

His parents had wandered deeper into the museum while he stayed behind with his sisters. He held his little sister’s hand. Nadia didn't care about the weapons either, they had that much in common, though her disinterest might have stemmed from the fact she was ten years old. He squeezed her hand a little harder every time she tried to slip away from him. 

Their sister Ada however, was very invested. She was technically supposed to be watching her younger siblings, but she mostly kept taking pictures of everything on her phone and sending them to her friends. Dedue didn't know anyone who’d care about pictures of rusty old swords, then again, he didn't have that many friends. 

Eventually, even Fodlan ran out of weapons and they entered a room full of paintings. Ada took selfies with the portraits she thought looked the funniest. Dedue looked around while still clutching tightly to Nadia’s hand. Several portraits of nobility hang on the walls, but only one in particular captured his attention. 

The painting was the largest one in the room, but that’s not why he was so drawn to it. In the Intricate gold frame was a portrait of two men, a King on his throne and a large man in armor standing next to him. A man obviously of Duscur descent in a Fodlanese painting this old would have interested him any other time. Now the King had his undivided attention. 

It was strange how he was sure he had never seen the painting before, but it felt familiar. The deja vu feeling was overwhelming and uncomfortable. He felt like his knees were about to give in. He let go of his sister’s hand without thinking. 

No piece of art had ever captured his heart like this. The room around him seemed suddenly very quiet as if he was alone there. The king had a serious expression on the painting, but Dedue could easily imagine him smiling. He should smile. 

Something resonated with his heart and soul. He reached out to touch the canvas, his fingers just inches away, yearning for something he couldn't explain before he remembered you couldn’t do that in the museum. He retracted his hand slowly.

“He looks kinda like dad,” Ada said.

Dedue hadn't even noticed his sister standing next to him. 

“What?” he asked with a raspy voice.

“I said he looks kinda like our dad,” Ada repeated.

Dedue almost asked who, but then he tore his gaze away from the King and looked at the picture as a whole. Ada was correct. The man standing on the King’s right side looked remarkably like their father, if their father had been scarred and stern-looking. 

Dedue glanced at the title plaque under the painting. 

_“Unknown artist,  
King Dimitri and his vassal,  
1193,  
Oil paint on canvas.”_

The name of the King was Dimitri. That felt right. 

Dedue wasn't sure what exactly a vassal was, but he had a feeling that it was important. It must be if he was in this giant portrait with the King. It felt important to him, like an answer to a quiz that he knew he had read but still couldn’t quite recall.

“I wasn't looking at him,” Dedue admitted.

“The King then?”

“Yeah.”

Ada looked at the painted King to see what captured her brother’s interest. The man looked tired beyond his years, had only one eye, and looked like he should wash his hair. There were much prettier paintings in the hall. 

“The painter was very talented,” she said diplomatically. 

Dedue nodded, completely disinterested in his sister’s opinion. 

“Do you want to come with us to look at the landscape paintings? I think they have flowers.” 

He shook his head and continued staring at the painting. Ada shrugged and took Nadia by hand and led her to the next room. 

Every now and then an occasional tourist would stand next to him to take a good look at the artwork but to his surprise, no one seemed to appreciate it as much as he did. How come no one could feel what he did. 

Ada came to check on him and tried to get him to move a couple of times later, but Dedue stayed in front of King Dimitri’s painting, utterly mesmerized until his parents came to tell him it was time to leave the museum. He shot one last longing look at the painting.

On the way out they stopped by the museum gift shop. His sisters were bickering over postcards and souvenir magnets for their friends. He stood still next to them, lost in his thoughts. The ache had not faded. 

In a mild panic, he realized that there probably would have been more paintings of King Dimitri in the museum, and he missed them all. There was little doubt that he could find all of those online, but it wouldn’t be the same.

“That’s the one,” he heard Ada say to their father. 

He tried to collect his thoughts and focus on the present. He didn’t see what they were talking about until his father tucked a receipt in his pocket and placed a brand new book in Dedue’s hands, smiling gently. 

“Savior King,” the cover said with bold blue letters. 

The cover’s art was unmistakenly of King Dimitri, but it still didn't look exactly like he should. Dedue wasn't sure why he felt like that since there wasn't anything obviously off with it. Perhaps he just thought so because he only had seen one picture of the King. 

He flipped the book open. The cover was newer artwork, the introduction told him, the artist had born long after the King had already died. The cover image was based on other portraits of the King. 

Dedue caressed the glossy cover gently. His parents smiled, their son rarely got this excited over anything. He was an unusually serious child. Nadia laughed at him for ”making heart eyes'' at a book. Dedue felt his cheeks heat up but couldn’t exactly deny it.

Back at the hotel, he crashed into his bed with his shoes still on and opened the book at a random page. There were so many chapters about war. Dedue flipped through the pages. 

He stopped at a page with the same image as the painting he had seen in the museum. Out of all the pictures in the book, this one was his favorite. There was a whole chapter for his vassal. Dedue’s heart skipped a beat when he read the name. It was the same as his. His name was very common, there were three Dedue’s in his grade at school. Molinaro was not an uncommon last name either. But still. 

Dedue skipped at the end of the chapter. 

__

_“While they behaved as lord and vassal in public, it is said that Dimitri and Dedue were more like family in private. When Dimitri finally fell to illness, Dedue tended to his liege's deathbed, and then took up a post at his grave for the rest of his days. When the time came, they were buried beside each other.”_

King Dimitri never married, and the throne was inherited by the illegitimate child of his late uncle. Interesting. 

His reading was interrupted by his sister.

“Do you think he’s cute? I don't think he’s cute,” Nadia asked.

“What?”

Nadia pried the book off his hands and waved the cover in front of their sister.

“Ada, do you think he’s cute?”

“No,” Ada said without looking up from her phone. 

“Dedue thinks he’s cute.”

Ada looked up at this, “Really?”

“I do not,” Dedue protested meekly. 

“You do.”

“Give me my book back, please.”

Nadia only laughed and ran around in circles until Ada took the book from her and handed it back to Dedue.

“Thank you.”

Dedue looked at the picture on the cover once more. Okay, maybe King Dimitri was sort of cute. But just a little.

“Why do you even care about him?” Nadia asked. 

Dedue didn't answer because he didn't know why. Why indeed did he care about some long-dead foreign King? How could he even begin to explain that he felt like he had found some long lost part of himself? A part he hadn’t even known was missing. And that he found it from some stuffy old war museum of all the places. 

He slept with King Dimitri’s biography under his pillow that night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is actually my second fic with Dedue's sisters.


	2. Present

After three years, Dedue’s infatuation with King Dimitri had not diminished. If anything, it just kept growing. 

When he was twelve, his parents had thought it was cute, by his fifteenth birthday they found it mildly concerning. To him, they always said that being passionate about one’s hobbies was nice, but when they thought he wasn’t listening, they wondered if this was normal anymore.

His sisters did say to his face that they thought he was odd. They were never unkind about it, however. Ada had even cut his hair the way King Dimitri’s Dedue had in the painting. The hairstyle was surprisingly modern as the undercut had not gone out of fashion in all these years.

Dedue had amassed a small library of history books regarding King Dimitri and an even more impressive online collection of articles. He had done his research and learned so much about the Savior King. As a long since deceased historical figure, there was a mountain of conflicting records of his life and achievements. 

King Dimitri’s life was also tightly tied around the darkest part of Duscur’s history, which made it difficult to read at times. With a heavy heart, Dedue had studied both the good and the bad times. 

While he was by no means forgotten by Fodlanese historians, Duscur had far more literature on King Dimitri’s Dedue. Across all texts, there was much speculation about the “true” nature of the relationship between the King and his vassal. 

Dedue was around the same age as that Dedue was when he met his Dimitri. Now there was a thought. 

His hobby brought him significant amounts of joy, but at the same time, there was a strange feeling at the back of his mind like he had forgotten something. Like he was trying to build something without instructions. A key piece seemed to be missing, but he had no way of making sure.

He also had a secret scrapbook of pictures of the King he had printed out. It was lovingly crafted. The images were in chronological order and he had decorated the pages with colorful tape and some stickers. He prayed to the Gods that his sisters would never find that one. 

It was late afternoon; the school had ended over an hour ago. Dedue had taken a long way home to stop by the garden to see how the flowers were doing. His aunt was in charge of them, and in exchange for help, she would let him pick some. It wouldn’t be long till they’d be in full bloom. 

Once again he found himself thinking pointless things, such as if King Dimitri had had a favorite flower. Dedue could easily picture him in a greenhouse or by a field, but in his imagination, the King never looked at the flowers.

He passed by the corner store when a glimpse of golden hair snapped Dedue out of his daydreams. 

Two boys around his age, whom he had never seen before, stood by a cafe. Dedue was too far away to hear them but it seemed like they in the middle of a mild argument. Before Dedue could get a better look, the boy was pulled inside the cafe by his friend.

Without a second thought, Dedue followed the pair into the cafe. The barista gave him a quick nod. Dedue and the pair of strangers were the only customers there. 

Dedue tried his best to get a better look at the shorter boy discreetly. He stood back to Dedue, who only got a view to his shoulder-length hair. Dedue started wondering if following the strangers had been a mistake. What was even the point of this?

The boy’s companion had already ordered. He looked irritated and tapped his fingers on the counter repeatedly. Dedue estimated he was a bit older than he was. Guessing someone’s age was difficult. People kept mistaking him for an adult all the time.

“Oh, come on. Just choose something, Dimitri. There’s a queue,” the irritated young man said. 

Dedue almost choked on air. _Dimitri._ It was not a rare name by any means, but it still felt like fate. The near-empty cafe felt crowded.

“My apologies. I’ll take a chamomile tea,” Dimitri said and turned to face Dedue, “and a cinnamon blend tea for you, correct?”

Dimitri smiled brightly and looked up to Dedue, waiting for his answer. His right eye was blind, but Dedue knew that already. He knew Dimitri already. He knew him better than he knew anything else. 

Dedue had almost forgotten that there was a question. He nodded silently as words got stuck in his throat. Cinnamon blend tea was one of his favorites.

Dimitri’s companion leaned in, eyes narrowed. He didn’t feel familiar to Dedue in other ways, but there was something mildly annoying about those amber eyes. 

“You know this guy?” He asked Dimitri. 

“Uh, no?” Dimitri blinked in confusion. Dedue shook his head to confirm this. Technically they hadn’t met before.

“Listen, Glenn,” Dimitri stammered after thinking for a while, “I think Felix would like that sword we saw at the antique shop.”

Glenn rolled his eyes.

“You aren’t subtle,” he said, “but alright. I’ll leave you two alone for now”.

Dimitri sighed in relief but Glenn kept glaring at him. 

“Don’t think you’re off the hook. You’ll have to tell me what this was about later,” Glenn huffed, “and if you are not here when I come back, I’ll stab you both with Felix’s new sword.”

“Thank you, Glenn,” Dimitri said, entirely unbothered. 

“Don’t get in any trouble and don’t break anything.”

Dimitri waved as Glenn stomped off. 

“I am sorry about that,” Dimitri said to Dedue, “he means well.”

Dedue nodded as if anything about Glenn was important at this moment. 

“His brother likes swords,” Dimitri continued.

Dedue nodded again. He had never been one for small talk, but now he was truly at a loss of words. He was woefully unprepared for this. He bit his lip, trying to assemble his thoughts into anything coherent. He failed at that and Dimitri took his silence all wrong and started looking panicked. 

“I am so sorry, I don’t know what I was thinking. I thought you were someone I know. No idea who though”

“I understand,” Dedue hurried to say.

“You do?” Dimitri lifted his gaze from his shoes.

“I think so.”

It was a weak answer but it would do for now. Dimitri’s expression brightened, and in that smile Dedue was certain he had found his King. 

“I’m Dedue,” he said, and Dimitri nodded like he knew that already. Maybe he did. 

Dimitri paid for two teas and Glenn’s coffee that would go cold without its drinker. Dimitri rambled on whether or not he should order Glenn another one later. They sat at the corner table. 

The barista was the boyfriend of Dedue’s cousin. In a town this small, that would mean his entire family would hear about this before he’d even get home. He couldn’t really tell them he already knew Dimitri, and he was not known of making friends on the spot. 

That would be a problem for another time, though. He wanted to focus on Dimitri now. To be honest, it was difficult to think about anything else. There was so much he wanted to ask Dimitri. So much he wanted to tell him. He wanted to share his secrets with Dimitri. He wanted to talk about mundane things he usually wouldn’t even consider twice. Instead, he stared into his tea meekly.

He had say something. He couldn’t let Dimitri think he was uninterested. 

“Why are you here?” Escaped from his mouth before he could think it through. 

Awkward and rude. This couldn’t go worse even if he tried. Dimitri didn’t seem to mind his clumsy words. He leaned closer to explain.

“My parents are here for work. They decided to bring me along, and Glenn is here to babysit- to keep me company.”

“I live here,” Dedue offered in return as if it was not obvious.

Dimitri nodded, grateful that the conversation was going somewhere. He went on about his father and stepmother. About his stepsister, who was spending time with her father now. Dedue listened to every word with attention. While telling his story, Dimitri snapped his teaspoon in half by accident. He looked embarrassed but Dedue was mesmerized. 

Initial awkwardness aside, it all felt right. Comfortable. Dedue was able to relax a bit as Dimitri kept looking at him with familiar warmth in his eye. 

Dimitri glanced at his expensive but cracked phone screen. Glenn would be back soon. He pushed stray hair strands behind his hair, looking shy and asked, “Forgive me if this is too forward, but could I have your number? I’d like to speak with you again.”

Dedue wondered if next time he’d actually manage to speak to Dimitri. He would try. Dimitri’s kind smile let him believe that he’d have all the time in the world to get it right.

Dedue took his phone out of his bag and realized something. Both of his lock screen and background image were King Dimitri, he simply couldn’t let this Dimitri see that. Dimitri held out his hand, but Dedue held his phone closer to himself defensively. 

“Um, could you just tell me your number?” Dedue asked. 

Dimitri obliged as Glenn returned, slamming the door open harder than necessary. Dimitri stood up and handed him his cold coffee. Glenn took a sip of it and shrugged. 

“Alright, this playdate is over, we gotta go,” he said. 

Dedue was reluctant to let Dimitri go.

Dimitri shook Dedue’s hand before leaving. Dedue held onto it for too long, and Dimitri wasn’t in a hurry to let go either. Glenn frowned at them, but that didn’t matter. Dimitri smiled.


	3. Future

With Dimitri by his side, even the long weapon halls of the Fhridiad Museum felt warm and welcoming. The weapons and armor stored there were just old rusty objects, and they did not scare Dedue anymore. Even the mightiest relic paled in comparison to the smile on Dimitri’s face when he looked at Dedue. 

They were holding hands as they so often did. Their hands were soft and uncalloused. The deepest scar Dedue had was a faded mark on his thumb from a minor cooking accident. Dimitri had a fair share of dents and scratches on him, but they were from sports-filled childhood and not from a life of war.

At noon during a weekday, there weren't too many other people in the museum. Dedue browsed through a museum guide brochure one-handedly and without much interest in it. He had picked it up from the entrance out of habit. Perhaps one day they would do the whole tour together. Dimitri had been in the museum before too, several times. He had lived his whole life in the city after all. 

Dedue was no tourist either. He had moved to Fhridiad to be near Dimitri as soon as possible. Faerghus was probably the worst place in Fodland to study cuisine, as his family had reminded him to no end, but he still wanted to go. 

The future was open with opportunities, they had yet to decide where they’d like to settle down for good. The only certain thing was a list of places from their past lives they’d like to visit at least once.

Today they were in the museum just for one thing. 

Dimitri was eager to get there already. He pulled Dedue from room to room. Dimitri had hit two major growth spurts after they had met, yet he was still almost head shorter than Dedue. 

Finally, they arrived at their destination. The royal portrait loomed over them as impressive as it had been the day Dedue first saw it here. It had been twelve years since. It was the very point of museums to preserve things, but it unnerved Dedue how little the portrait had changed since its painting. 

“And here we are,” Dimitri gestured to the painting. 

Dedue remembered more now. Not all of it, but moments and details from his past life. Some details that he could recall were small, like how the frame the picture was in was not the original, no matter what history books claimed. Some memories were far more significant, like the way he had felt standing behind Dimitri for this portrait. How significant the mere act of standing behind the king for this image had been. 

“Here we are,” Dedue echoed, looking at Dimitri. His Dimitri. 

This Dimitri was happier, unburdened as the weight of an entire continent did not rest on his shoulders. He started fumbling through his messenger bag for his phone. Dedue tilted his head in question.

“Your sisters asked that I would send a picture,” Dimitri explained.

“Both of them?”

“Separately” 

Dedue sighed. His family never let him forget that his fiance was not his first Dimitri. They often made a lighthearted mockery of how Dedue had an oddly specific type. If they only know how specific. Only one man across all time and space. 

Ada and Nadia referred to Dimitri as “his highness” when he was not there. Dedue had corrected them that the correct form of address was “his majesty”, which had only made his sisters laugh harder. They also used a crown emoji as a shorthand for Dimitri in family group chat.

He let them laugh because his family, despite their amusement, was nothing but warm and welcoming to Dimitri.

“I might have to send one to my sister too,” Dimitri continued.

Dedue chuckled dryly, unsure Edelgard would care for such a picture, but leaned closer to Dimitri, who tried his best to get a picture of them in the way the painting was also visible. It proved to be a challenging task. They were big enough to block most of the painting from the photo. Dimitri frowned at the camera. 

Before Dedue could protest, Dimitri removed his arm from Dedue’s shoulders and approached a tourist group.

“Excuse me, could you please take a picture of us?” He waved his cracked phone for emphasis.

Dimitri handed over his phone to a woman with a kind smile and snapped back to Dedue’s side as if he had never left. The lady snapped a couple of shots and gave Dimitri his phone back. Dimitri thanked the tourists profusely for their time and scrolled through the pictures taken. 

Neither of them were particularly photogenic. Smiles came easier for both of them this time around, but smiling at command was still difficult. Looking at the photos, Dedue had a newfound appreciation for the painter since they clearly weren't easy art subjects.

“This one looks cute, '' Dimitri said, showing the said picture to Dedue. 

It was not cute. Dimitri’s working eye was not looking towards the camera at all, and Dedue had forgotten to smile for this one. They both looked remarkably stiff. 

“I'm not sure about that,” he said.

“Your expression is similar in both pictures,” Dimitri pointed to the painting.

“That’s just how my face is”

“Your face is handsome,” Dimitri smirked. 

Dedue scoffed at the cheesy reply, but a smile tugged the corners of his mouth. 

Dimitri had put his phone away without sending the pictures and kept staring at the painting again with a sorrowful expression. He had insisted on coming here in the first place, for a celebration of things anew, he had said. The reality of the situation, however, seemed overwhelming.

The more Dedue remembered, the less power the past held over him. Gone was the unexplained dull ache of longing he had felt in his youth. The same was not true for Dimitri. 

Dedue gently grasped Dimitri’s shoulder and turned him away from the painting. A couple of tourists gave them curious looks before remembering to mind their own business. Dimitri brought his hand to Dedue’s face. He traced his thumb over the unmarred skin of Dedue’s forehead, where the painting equivalent had a deep scar. 

Dedue could already tell where Dimitri’s thoughts had landed, but he waited for Dimitri to voice his concerns. They had had conversations of this sort before. Tried to piece together memories and meanings

“Perhaps in this life, I won't be a source of pain for you,” Dimitri whispered.

Guilt had carried over hundreds of years. Even rebirth could not erase every regret from Dimitri’s kind heart. While the very kindness was the reason Dedue believed his heart longed for Dimitri’s in any possible universe or future, it was mistaking here. While his past life circumstances had been tragic and unfair, the blame didn't lie with Dimitri.

Dedue took Dimitri’s free hands into his own. 

“I may not remember everything,” he said softly, “but I do know this; I chose you. I chose to be by your side, and I am willing to repeat the action over and over.”

“I suppose I can live with that,” Dimitri said, relief in his voice.

He lowered his hand from Dedue’s face, lifted up Dedue’s left hand, and kissed his ring.

**Author's Note:**

> <3


End file.
